It's only the end of the world
by Hedon's Haberdashery
Summary: The apocalypse is hard when you're not a player character: Real people deal with the terrifying fallout of a typical session of Sburb.
1. Sburb

It was only three weeks ago that that damned game came in the mail. It's so strange to think about; it feels like it was years ago.

I still don't understand where it came from, but I was what you might call a "serious gamer", and the PC game of the year wasn't something to miss. An indie release, I'd ordered it directly from the company's website. Skaianet. Who the hell are they? It keeps me up at night, sometimes. How did they make this game? And why? Sometimes I imagine that one of those bastards somehow survived, that I can just find some scrawny little developer asshole and demand that he give me the answers. I want to _know_ something, for certain, to have some real understanding of this awful thing. But I know it's just a fantasy; I'm sure everyone from Skaianet is dead now.

So I spent four weeks in agony. There were no real reviews, no playthroughs or leaked clips of the gameplay. The buzz was intense, but there was no substance. It was like the game was being kept under wraps, but _really_ under wraps. As in no information. Nada.

By that fourth week it was really bugging me. I was pacing nervously, glancing outside to check the flag on the mailbox more often than could possibly be healthy. When my mom asked me what I was watching for out the window like that, I could hardly understand the question. What did she mean, what was I watching for? Wasn't Sburb, the game of the year, the center of her life as it was of mine?

She probably thought I was crazy. In my hours of stupid trawling through PC gaming forums and shady websites, I managed to track down exactly one review, in the online edition of Game Bro magazine. "Why the 'Game of the Year' or Whatever isn't as good as some other stuff I like that's better", the title read. I groaned. A _joke_. A sick _joke_. What kind of a website does satirical game reviews, anyway? Who would even read that? I clicked through anyway, to see if the article had any real information on the game. "Subscription Needed, Doggg!" the website informed me. I think that was the point at which I swore out loud.

My mom then came into the room, wondering what I was doing and has she really just heard that foul language out of my mouth? I told her that she had. She wasn't amused. "Don't be smart with me, young man! Go up to your room! You are grounded at _least_ for the rest of today!"

I had already hurriedly closed off my tabs on instinct when she came into the room. Now, with her standing directly behind me and ready to watch me go up to my room, I simply held down the power button until the computer screen went dark. It's a terrible habit, but I didn't really much care at that point. I trudged up the stairs to my room.

I did not appreciate being grounded, and thus torn away from my perpetual quest for Sburb information, but I decided it would probably be good for me. I flopped down onto my bed. My impatience for this game was starting to become an obsession. It was too secret; too widely praised for how little there was to find about it. I seemed doomed to find out nothing about this game beyond "Immersive Multiplayer Sandbox Simulation" until it actually showed up in my mailbox.

I took out my phone (which I was not supposed to have with me, as I was grounded) and texted my friend Robert. He had ordered a copy of Sburb as well, so we could play it together online, but he was probably not as obsessed as me and could probably calm me down a little bit. "Hey, what's up. Did your Sburb come yet?" I asked him. A pause. "Nope. I'm not tearing my hair out about it, though. Indie companies can be pretty unreliable about shipping," he sent back. I scowled facetiously at no one in particular. "What makes you think I'm tearing my hair out? You know what a patient soul I am," I wrote. "Ha!" he texted back. "But seriously though, that fuckin game had better show up soon. This thing is driving me up a wall. You know there's no demos or anything online? Not one YouTube video. Some people must have already gotten it though, right?" I said. After a moment, he wrote "Just take it easy. The game will come when it comes."

At that moment, I happened to glance up from the screen and out the window. Outside, I saw the mailman walk up to our mailbox. I watched him intently. Then, out of his satchel he pulled a pair of square envelopes, like discs. I couldn't see what was written on them, but there was obviously some kind of big green logo...

I held my breath. It couldn't be. But it was, of course it was, it had to be! There was no mistaking it.

Now, just a few weeks later, I look back on that moment and imagine what would have happened if I had acted differently. What if I hadn't looked up at the window, and I had missed the game until that evening, or even the next day? What if I had just stayed put, put my excitement on hold, waited until I was ungrounded before getting my hands on it? Sometimes I wish I had. Because if I hadn't gone out of my room, snuck downstairs and taken that game right then, on that day, then I would have died within 24 hours. And then I wouldn't be forced to live through what it did to me.


	2. Client Player

When I spotted the discs outside my window, I knew I had a good chance of making it down to grab them immediately. My mom was almost definitely working again, descended back into her office where she could be busy with paperwork and not have to deal with her deadbeat son. I crept down the stairs on tiptoe, not wanting to alert her that I was out of my room. It seemed to work. Not a peep.

The front door was another issue. My mom's office faced directly out onto the hallway which led to the living room, which opened out to the outside by the front door. I could probably sneak past her office door without getting caught - she was invariably facing away from it, buried in her work - but opening the front door would be a dead giveaway.

I thought about it for a moment, and retreated back through the kitchen and quietly out the back door, further from my mom's earshot. Outside, the air was warm and damp, like it had either just rained or was just about to. A breeze whistled very softly through the tree in the neighbor's yard.

For a moment I just stood outside, enjoying the weather, but I really had no time to waste. Carefully ducking under the window of my mom's office, I scurried around to the front of the house. Rounding the corner, I saw the mailbox; the flag was still up, my game would be in there. My breath caught with excitement. Frantically, I opened the mailbox and reached inside. I pulled out two discs, wrapped in brown square envelopes and stamped with the green logo of Sburb.

There it was.

I wanted to scream with joy, but I remembered that I was still on a stealth mission. I was, after all, supposed to be grounded. With a stupid smile on my face I ran around the house, past the window, through the back door and back up the stairs. I probably wasn't close to as quiet this time, but somehow my mom failed to catch on. Through whatever quirk of fate, she didn't stop me. I kept the game. I made it back up to my room, the discs clutched against my chest.

I felt thrilled with adrenaline. That _had_ been risky. If my mom had turned around at just the wrong moment, I could have been grounded for much longer than a week - and I might never have had a chance to play Sburb.

But here I was, and I had them. I sent Robert a text: "I got the game! Just came in the mail. " After a moment of consideration, I sent another: "!"

He texted back. "Excellent. I'm installing mine as we speak," he said. This tamped my enthusiasm quite a bit. "You got yours already? Why didn't you tell me?" I wrote. "Dude, it's fine. We have to play this thing in tandem anyway," he wrote back. "Okay, so what do I do? Which disc am I supposed to be using?" I said. "Put in the client player disc. I'm already playing as server, so that way we could connect to each other," he said.

"How do you know so much about this, anyway?" I asked, slightly peeved. "An educated guess," he wrote back. I rolled my eyes. His instruction made sense, if that was how the game was set up. And why two discs? It felt strangely retro. With a little bit of a mental shrug, I stuck the "CLIENT" disc into my computer. With a flash of blank green, the Skaianet logo appeared. A spinning spirograph filled the screen. My heart raced; this was it. Keeping with the retro theme, white lettering started to scroll down the display:

**SBURB version 0.0.1**

**(c) SKAIANET SYSTEMS INCORPORATED. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.**

**SBURB client is running.**

**A SBURB host user is attempting to connect with you.**

**Client has established connection with host.**

**Press [ENTER] when ready.**

I hit Enter. Seemingly just a second later. a text appeared from Robert: "Oh my god, this thing is fucking scary. Can you see that?" "See what?" I sent back, irritated. My screen had just gone blank. He texted back, "Call me. Now." It seemed curt, urgent. I felt a weird rush of adrenaline, like an understanding that something very serious was going on.

We had begun to play.

* * *

"Dude, do you have some kind of rotating webcam setup? And you just leave it unprotected for -" "I don't have any kind of webcam. And I definitely don't leave anything unprotected. What do you take me for? But seriously, is your game working? Because I'm just getting this blank screen, and I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing," I said.

On the other end, I could hear Robert breathing heavily. "I'm looking at your room, dude. I see /you/. I can see you talking on your phone right now. But I can move it, and pivot it, like it's part of the game."

I stood still for a moment, trying to take this in. "You're fuckin with me, dude. Come on," I said. Robert wasn't the kind of person who would do that, he was always reserved in his humor, but this- how did a camera get in my room? Why would he be able to /control/ it, like it was part of the game? It was too unreal. I could understand using webcams of the other player for immersion or whatever; it was a good idea. Very immersive. But where the hell was the camera?

"I wouldn't do that to you, dude. I can see you right now. You look like you're trying not to freak out," he said. "I'm not freaking out. I'm saying that I think you're lying. Here," — I held up three fingers — before I could finish the question, he said "Three fingers. Wait, you're putting them down. You _are_ freaking out." Hastily, he added "It's fine, dude, I'm freaking out too. This is weird. Oh, watch out, I'm gonna try doing a tight swivel around your face with this. That should force it to come out in the open."

I waited, but nothing seemed to happen. My room was still and quiet as a grave. A light breeze from the open window fluttered the corner of a poster on my wall. It was a nice Pink Floyd poster, and I made a mental note to fix the adhesive. Nothing else was moving.

"Nothing. I can't believe it," Robert said. I startled a little bit; I'd almost forgotten about the phone at my ear. "This is creepy. I don't like this at all," I said. At that moment, a thought occured to me. "Can you hear me, too?" I asked, pulling the phone away from my ear. "Hello? One two three, testing," I said. I lifted up the phone again. Robert said "What are you doing, dumbass?" "So you can't hear me," I said. "Not except through the phone. It's just a camera, I guess," he said. Paradoxically, I felt a wave of relief at this revelation. He couldn't hear me. No microphones. There were limits to what this thing could do.

I breathed out a slow sigh. "This thing is creepy. I don't understand it, and I don't like it. But I guess we might as well keep playing."


	3. Server Player

Before we went any further, I insisted that he send me some representation of what was happening on his screen. Print screen was no use, because we didn't dare quit out of the game. Eventually, he ended up taking a shitty photo of his computer screen with the camera on his phone. I had the photo open on my phone, and I was trying to understand it. "Okay, so we don't know how this creepy camera thing is working, but the rest of the game must be just a straight sandbox game or something. I don't know. Just - just try one of those buttons up there. Let's see what the meat of this brilliant game is like," I said.

"Roger that. Let's try just going into 'select' mode - okay, my cursor changed." "How so? If it's a crosshairs, don't click," I said. That got a chuckle from Robert. "No, it's just this blocky 3-d version of the logo. I'll tell you if anything interesting happens. Meanwhile, why don't you try contacting Derek? If he's got his copy already, he'll probably let you play server to him," he said. "Dude, he's your friend," I said. Robert didn't say anything.

"Hello?" "Yeah, nothing's really happening. Your bed is lighting up green. Like it's highlighted really closely," he said. I gawked. "Like the exact outline?" I asked. "Mhmm." "Goddammit, I need to see this thing! I thought that kind of CV was years away!" I said.

"You can play if you want to, dude. Just talk to Derek," he said. "I don't even _know_ Derek-" I took another look at my monitor, the mockingly cyclical spirograph animation filling my screen, spinning in and out. "Let's play around with this a little bit first. I'm still really not sure about this thing. The hidden cameras and everything," I said. "All right. Let's just see what happens when I-"

* * *

I was facing towards my computer at that moment, facing away from my bed. Behind my head, I heard a little /swish/ of air. I felt it ruffle my hair for a split-second, only a little stronger than the breeze that had been blowing in through the window. And then a split-second later, I felt that internal sense of weight and power, goosebumps and the instinctive knowledge of enormous force, and danger.

And just half of a second later, I heard the enormous, terrible crash; bits of drywall and larger pieces flew towards my face, terrible danger and I threw myself to the ground, knowing that my life was in danger. Dust started to make my eyes water, I felt like choking and crying. Much louder than I needed to, trying to match the calamitous noise I had just heard, I screamed "/What in the/ hell /was that!/"

The phone had skittered away from me, and I tried to grab for it from my prone position; I failed. Then I remembered that Robert could just _see_ me - he knew what had happened. And this couldn't have had anything to do with him, could it?

Rattled, I slowly sat up, then stood up, grabbing up my phone as I stood. On the other end, Robert was already talking. "-had no idea, oh my god, I'm so sorry, dude! I thought that-" "All right! Enough!" I practically shrieked into the phone. He stopped talking. Slowly and deliberately, I asked "Do you, have any idea, what the /hell/ that was?"

"I- I think I might have done that. I don't know. It's this fucking game again, first the cameras and now this-" "What, exactly, did you do?" I asked. "Well, I was messing around a little bit with the select tool, and I clicked on your bed. It lit up outlined in green, like I told you, and so I figured I'd just try clicking and dragging. And then - well, you saw, I don't know, I wasn't trying to do anything, I swear! I'm so sorry, dude," he said.

When he mentioned my bed, I had turned around to look at, maybe survey the damage, if there had really been some kind of explosion. But what I saw was worse than that. It hadn't been an explosion. My bed was gone.

I saw a trail of dust and crumbs on the floor, the pillow lying like it had slammed into the wall beside where the bed had been. And the trail of debris led directly to the opposite wall - which was punctuated by a massive, crumbling hole.

"Oh my god..." I said. Gingerly, I walked over to the half-destroyed wall. Peering through, I could see the wreckage of a sudden impact, as the destroyed bedframe lay in splinters on the sidewalk outside. It had smashed against the concrete, tearing apart the sheets and leaving scraps of cloth and wood splinters all over the ground. The bare skeleton of the frame was still intact, although broken and collapsed in places.

"Are you sure that _you_ did that? It could've been some kind of - I don't know. Something. How could that possibly have been connected to what you did on the screen?" I said. "I don't know, dude, but I'm positive I did that. I can test it again- don't worry! I'll be extremely careful. Just turn around and watch that pillow," he said. The pillow against the wall. A smart choice. Worst case scenario, something would just get slammed with a soft pillow.

I locked onto it; I wanted to see this. And as I watched, right before my eyes, that dusty pillow slowly rose up into the air. "You're- you're doing this? You're lifting the pillow right now?" I asked. "Of course I am. You can see it too, right? It's not just some genius visual simulation on my screen, right?" he said.

"Of course I can see it. Holy shit," I said. It really was just floating there, hovering in the air. I reached out and touched it. It felt completely real, the same soft fabric as always. There was a little bit of dust from what had happened to the bed, but I could see the particles streaming down through the air, settling down on the ground beneath it. The corner of the pillowcase flapped slightly in the breeze. "Holy shit," I said again. It was really floating. Experimentally, I grabbed onto the corner of the pillowcase and gave it a sharp tug. It gave just a little, like a levitating magnet, but only by a couple inches. When I let go, it bobbed back into place. "That is so weird. It's like you're tugging on my mouse. Here, I'm letting go now," he said. The pillow immediately dropped to floor with a little _pumf_.

I stood for a moment and just stared at the pillow, inert on the floor in front of me. "That is completely unreal. How much can you do with this thing? Can you, like, lift anything?" I asked. "Well, I could sure lift the bed, and that's more than I could take on my own. I- I don't know. God, dude, this is so surreal. It's like a fucking dream or something. None of this makes sense." he said. I nodded emphatically in agreement. "I'm not sure I want to keep playing. This game is dangerous," I said.

"I don't think it'll be dangerous if we just stay in control. I'm operating all this stuff, I'll just be very careful. I mean, look, dude, I don't know how this stuff works, but it does! This is happening! I mean, aren't you even a little curious about what's going on here?" he said.

"This is way too much, I don't understand it and I can feel that it's dangerous. I can't even see the controls, _I'm_ the one who's being controlled. I'm just flying blind, and for all I know I'm two seconds away from getting my head bashed in with a piece of furniture. That bed could have killed me, you know. It must have flown, like, three feet from the back of my head!" I paused for breath. This was frightening me more than I was letting on. I was having trouble thinking straight. "You trust me, don't you?" he said. "I trust you. But I want to _do_ something, at least. Could you- could you contact Derek, and tell him to install his Client disc? I'd like to get a good look at these controls."


	4. 4 Hours, 13 Minutes

_Author's Note: Keep in mind that the characters in this story seem to have gotten their mail a fair bit later in the day than John & co. did._

* * *

I could tell Robert was feeling really repentant, because he didn't give me a word of "Talk to Derek your damn self"; all he said was "I'm gonna have to hang up on you for a while." "Just _don't click on anything_ until I'm back on the line," I said. He was silent for a second. Then he said "Oh, right, sorry, I forgot you can't see me, too. I'm nodding. Don't worry, my hands are staying off the mouse." "Great," I said.

He hung up.

Still shaking a little bit from the reality of what we were doing, I started to slit open the brown paper "SERVER" envelope with my finger. The edge of the paper sliced my fingertip. "Ow, fuck," I muttered under my breath, letting the small pool of blood soak into the edge of the paper. As good there as anywhere, I thought, since I didn't keep tissues around in my room. My finger dried up quickly, and I started to pull the green-patterned CD out of its envelope. But just at that moment, I heard footsteps coming up the stairs.

My mom. Without thinking, I slammed shut my laptop and stuffed the server disc and envelope underneath it on my desk - all on instinct, before it occurred to my rational mind that I had completely destroyed a wall of the house. The wind, picking up, was blowing straight in, whirling my papers into the air and blinding me with dust again when I turned to look at it. This was extremely serious. I should have gone to her anyway, my life could be in danger - really, it had been childish to keep playing this game. My mom just wanted to keep me safe, over all, and now I guess she could.

The door opened.

* * *

I don't think I quite know how to describe my mother's expression as she walked through that door, because I think she wasn't quite sure what expression she was trying to make. She had obviously heard the ungodly sound made by my bed smashing through the side of the house. I don't know if she had seen what had caused it yet, but in the second that she saw that gaping, dusty, windy crater in the white wall, I could swear her face was flickering between fear, relief, confusion, and fury like an old-fashioned TV. Finally, she opened her mouth, and then closed it again. Her eyes were watering. "You're okay," she said, like a question and a statement of pure relief. And then "Get down here _immediately_!"

I mentally chastised myself for the slight reluctance I felt as I came down the stairs after her. I - _we_ were dealing with potentially life-threatening powers. This was absolutely no time to be sulking over being found out. It's not like it would matter that I had been grounded, once I explained to her what was going on. If... if she believed me.

Which was something I had not considered until just that moment. Would she really believe this outrageous story? What I would I think, as a parent, if- but it was too late now. My mom was sitting in front of me, looking at me expectantly. I started talking.

I tried to explain to her about the game- she looked like she was about to speak when I mentioned sneaking the game upstairs, but I just kept talking and she didn't say anything - and about the invisible cameras, the controls, and the bed flying through my wall. "So there's definitely something going on. I think it's really serious," I said weakly, and then I stopped. She waited quietly for a couple seconds, still looking deeply concerned, as if she thought I was about to start up talking again. Then, realizing that I was done, she spoke. Her voice was trembling. "Honey, do you- do you really expect me to believe this? I'm at least as intelligent as you, young man, don't think you can talk your way out of this one with that kind of nonsense. Now tell me, _what have you been doing up there?_ You can trust me," she added, almost like an afterthought.

I gawked.

"I'm telling the truth! Is that not visible to you?" I practically shouted. My mom just shook her head.

I didn't know what to say. I felt torn: Was it even possible to convince her? "I'm not... lying to you," I said slowly. My mom opened her mouth, and my phone buzzed in my pocket. I felt a weird mix of panic and relief. "Don't you dare answer that!" she said, her voice rising as I grabbed the phone out of my pocket, and, seeing Robert's name, answered it. "Hello?" I said. He said "Danny, I-" "Don't call me that," I snapped on instinct. Then I remembered what we were doing and I shut up. "Dude, whatever! I'm up on my roof right now, and I think-" his voice faltered. "I think we're completely screwed," he said. It sounded like he was about to cry. "What is it?" I practically shouted into the phone. "J-just connect to Derek. Do it right now. I want to make sure he's okay," he said. The call ended.

"God_dammit_!" I shouted. My mom was looking absolutely furious, and she was standing up and advancing on me, but it didn't matter right now. I didn't know what Robert was talking about, but somehow, the game had gotten worse.

* * *

I raced up the stairs two at a time, leaving my mom storming up behind me. I ran into my room and slammed the door. It was totally futile; there were leaves and insects sprinkled all over the floor by the opening in my wall. Without pausing, I reached under my laptop and grabbed the game disc I'd stuffed under there.

I pulled out the disc and looked at my laptop. The spinning spirograph logo was still going on the screen. I decided it wasn't worth it to find out what would happen if I ejected the client disc.

My phone was ringing again. Robert again. "What _is_ it?" I said as I answered, hurrying back down the stairs as I answered. "Dude, you have to get out of the house! I don't think I'm gonna make it out of this, but if you-" the call cut off abruptly. He had been openly crying, not even hiding it anymore. I immediately called his number back; it rang ten times before going to voice mail.

Had he- died? No no no no no, I couldn't even think the word. I didn't try to call him back again. His, maybe, definitely not last words were "Get out of the house" - I knew there was only one thing to do.


	5. Impact

I ran. Pushed past my mom, out the front door. Whatever had happened to Robert - he must be okay, but whatever could have happened, I was ready to believe anything - I knew I must really be in danger. He had been crying over the phone. Crying to me. That wasn't what Robert was like, something horrible must have been happening...  
An awful image leaped into my brain, of Robert standing alone on his rooftop, tears streaming down his face, looking up at whatever terrible thing was going to kill him-

But no. I pushed the image out of my mind. Right now, I had to figure out where I was going. Outside, I decided to pause for a moment to look up. I don't know what exactly compelled me to look that way; maybe some subtle energy in the air, something about the way Robert had talked about being on the roof, had alerted me that it was from the sky that death would come.

Up in the sky, I saw a streak of fire through the air. A flash of light and a bang - I could swear I felt the earth tremor underneath me. Then, far in the distance, I heard a massive explosive _bang_, and smoke began billowing across the horizon, slicing across the sky like a knife. I touched my phone in my pocket, but there was no time for that. A sharp, screaming panic was now rising in my chest, the feeling of being witness to an utter catastrophe. My mind raced. Where could I run that would be safe from this- this nuclear war? This skyfall of meteors? Where could I run to?

I was still moving as I thought, trying to pace myself and avoid wearing out while I tore down sidewalk after sidewalk, rubber soles slapping on the pavement like rain.  
A destination formed in my mind as I was moving. In my school the cafeteria was in the basement, and it was marked with an old yellow sign that said "Air Raid Shelter", adorned with a symbol of nuclear power.

When I glanced up again I saw the sky filled with a hundred plumes of black smoke. I would have sworn that I could hear screams already. And then another one slashed across a cloud: a bright and deadly meteor, streaking towards my neighborhood behind me.

I ran without clear thought in my mind. I was running away from the path of the meteor, away from destruction, and that was all I knew.

I ran towards the school. I knew the way by heart, although I had never walked to it before. Or run. It was too far away for that. So now I was running towards it, and without stopping I tried to work out in my head where I should turn, imitating the path of a car going to the same place. Mental exertion made me more exhausted, faster, I thought I could feel the veins in my head burning just like the blood was pumping through my arms and burning in my legs. I heard my breathing loudly in my ears and echoing in my head while I careened forwards, seeking out the school where I imagined I might be safe.

Up ahead of me, two blocks ahead, the school building loomed into view. I ran faster still, feeling the sweat dump out of my pores as more terrible explosions shook the sky. I could feel the time running out. I felt like I was already dead. But if I just made it to the building- if I made it into the school- then maybe I could survive.  
I felt blinded by the sun as I approached the building. Cream-colored brick blended with the glare of the sun as I sweated after it, wanting to shout, to scream, but not wanting to waste my precious remaining breath.

I barreled into the door. It was locked. I slammed my hand down on the buzzer. "Let me in! Goddammit, this is an emergency! I need to use the shelter area! The basement! Just fucking let me in!" My heart pounding in my ears, I heard the door click and I fell into it. Thank god. Someone on the other side. Someone in the office must be buzzing people in.

As I stumbled inside, I saw someone dash out of the front office. A girl, maybe a few years older than I was, with close-cropped, blindingly blonde hair. "Okay, this guy has to be the last one! Everyone in!" she yelled. Grabbing me by the hand, she ran down the marble stairs, dragging me behind her. She pushed open the swinging door to the basement area and shoved me inside. I risked a glance behind me as she did, and I saw at least a half-dozen more people, mostly around my age, pushing and clamoring their way in. The girl was holding the door open, saying "Don't shove, assholes! We're all going to the same place!" One guy with a big earring and a goatee muttered "What, hell?" as he sat down a fee feet away from me. The girl didn't take any notice.

Finally everybody was inside. From my position of half-sitting, half-laying on the cold floor, I could see that there were only ten of us down here, give or take a few. Several people were up and walking around, milling in and out of the cafeteria and chatting nervously with each other. Some, like me and the sarcastic goateed guy next to me, were just sitting and waiting. We were just thankful that we were safe.

The girl with the chopped-off hair was pacing around rather manically, like any moment she might have to fend off some hideous danger. Her fists were balled and she was snapping orders like "How much food is in there? Is the refrigeration working? Well, go and check, then! _Christ_." at people, and they seemed to be following her commands.

I closed my eyes. She was in control; we had a leader here. And as people milled around and found ways to make themselves concerned, I was content to just lie there. Because I could feel that awful energy in the air. The feeling of an impending disaster. I braced myself for the impact.

_10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4,_

_3_

_2_

_1_


	6. The Reckoning

_A/N: Sorry for the hiatus! Updates should be more regular from here on out._

* * *

There was falling, I caught glimpses of a fluorescent light dropping to the floor. I hid my face again before it could land, an instinct that probably saved me as I heard the muffled crash of breaking glass, an explosion of light and cutting that rocketed in the dusty air. I heard more people screaming, and the clatter of footsteps. The ringing of the explosion still lingered in my ears, and I didn't leave the curled-up position where I lay.

I felt a bit of dust enter my throat, and I didn't cough. There was more to think about. That strange electricity still hummed in the air. It was building up now, as if to a crescendo, hissing slowly in my ears, in my brain, in my very _core_. I knew I couldn't stay here forever. I could feel in my bones that this place would not be allowed to survive. So I just stayed there, wrapped in my own arms and legs, for as long as I could. I didn't want to move, I didn't want to look up until it was really over. After a few minutes, when the world was more quiet, I felt someone try to poke me, thinking I was asleep, making sure I wasn't injured. I muttered that I was fine. I didn't want to hear this person's voice. I was never going to see these people again. Before long, things became very quiet, and all I heard was the sound of my own head.

I waited for hours, but not many. It may have been a trick of my mind, but the ambient light of the room seemed to dim, as if the sun was setting. I wasn't sure what time it was, and I didn't care.

Eventually I felt it. The crescendo was almost reached, and I could barely stand it any longer. My muscles were tense, like they were alive with fire. I felt ready to stand up and run like hell, to scream at the top of my lungs.

In a single fluid motion, I stood up and ran like a shot. My legs felt like they were moving a million miles an hour, as I pounded madly to the door. In the corner of my eye, I might have caught a glimpse of the short-haired girl trying to hold me back, as I shoved my way through the door, and up, up the staircase and out into the hot air. I didn't care.

The air was hot, even though it was evening, like the hot dusty feeling of a generator running in a closed garage. Everywhere around me, my eyes stung and I squinted to see the wreckage of my city. There were smoking craters, piles of burned-up walls and furniture and human bodies. I wanted to puke; I looked up, and the sky was filled with fire. "No! Fuck!" I screamed into the air, but I coughed and nobody heard me. The confused sounds of terror and devastation were too much to sort out inside my mind, but I could tell there was no one else around but me. We were all supposed to die.

And as if to punctuate that awful point, at that moment there was a wave of terror that almost swept me off my feet, a wall of force that knocked me down as it screamed and exploded right behind me. My back felt a terrible, searing heat as the meteor slammed into the school behind me, and I hoped the pain of heat dancing across my back didn't mean I'd been burned by the explosion. I thought I could hear the screams of the people in the basement I had just left behind.

It was too much. After a few minutes I pulled myself back up from the ruined sidewalk I had fallen on, and I just wanted to cry. It was too much. I wondered if my face was blackened with soot as I held back a wave of tears. But I scolded myself, holding back, and I didn't allow myself to leave the fearsome mindset I still had. I held onto my instincts, and my fear.

There was no time for anything else now. I only had one hope of making it through this ferocious holocaust, and that was to listen to the throbbing in my mind, anticipate where I was meant to die.

It thrummed again. Something was close by, about to happen. Without thinking I darted towards the wrecked shell of a house nearby. It wasn't a meteor this time, but another house, on fire, collapsing sideways, engulfing the spot where I had just been standing in a fiery inferno.

I knew that I had to keep moving. It was the only way. I kept going rapidly, purposefully, dodging the places where death was going to be. I kept moving, out of the city, jumping over yawning crevasses in the cracked pavement and carefully making my way around the huge, black billowing craters, which seemed to be centered around places where there would be big masses of people. I was breathing heavily, sweat running down my face, when I reached downtown. The baseball stadium was nothing but a deep, round blackness, pouring out acrid smoke.

I kept going. I just walked, and ran, as long as I could. I rested when I felt like I was relatively safe, but only ever for a minute or two. I would sit down for a quick breather on a scorched fire hydrant, maybe I would pause by a burst-open water main for a couple of gulps of water. But I didn't dare stay in one place too long; I just kept going until I couldn't see the city. My eyelids were heavy and crusted, and I was drawing on my last, hysterical reserves of strength when I collapsed in the open country. It was out in the middle of unbroken, scorched plains, where the thrumming in my skull was quiet enough that I trusted myself to sleep.


End file.
